Apple Suffers First Major Security Breach

Published September 21st at 1:00am

The famously secure app marketplace has finally been the victim of its first major attack. On Sunday September 20th, Apple released a statement saying that they had performed a large-scale cleanup of the App Store after several cyber security companies found malicious programming dubbed ‘XcodeGhost’ that was embedded in hundreds of legitimate apps for iPhone and iPad.

The full extent of the breach is so far unknown - Apple have been keeping quiet about the number of apps they have uncovered that were infected with the malicious code. It is believed that XcodeGhost was embedded into some apps by tricking developers into using a counterfeit version of Apple's Xcode - software which is used for creating genuine apps for mobile and for Mac.

Apple spokesperson, Christine Monaghan, said to Reuters: "We’ve removed the apps from the App Store that we know have been created with this counterfeit software… We are working with the developers to make sure they’re using the proper version of Xcode to rebuild their apps."

It is believed that the malware had limited functionality and, as such, there have been no examples of data theft or other harm as a result of XcodeGhost. Although this is reassuring for App Store users, it still represents a potentially damaging blow for Apple - a company which is renowned for its device security. Unless immediate action is taken, it is thought that developers’ machines could become a prime target for hackers - something which is very hard to defend against for Apple.